The price of ice cream made by China’s most famous brand of baijiu liquor, Mao-tai, has surged to 250 yuan (US$37) a cup, triggering public debate over the high price.
Mao-tai ice cream reported on Wednesday that each cup of the ice cream available online through third parties was priced between 120 yuan (US$18) and 250 yuan, a mark up of about four times the official price, in a Weibo post.
In May this year, the alcohol brand partnered with Chinese dairy company Mengniu to launch a series of baijiu-flavoured ice cream products. Flavours like tiramisu, classical original, vanilla and green plum are available with prices ranging from 50 yuan (US$7.50) to 66 yuan per cup.
Mao-tai has set up an extensive sales network, consisting of an app called iMao-tai and brick-and-mortar flagship stores.
Consumers who live in the Chinese provinces of Guizhou, Jiangsu and Jiangxi could buy ice cream via iMao-tai. However, now other consumers can’t access the products due to the high cost of logistics.
Private sellers in these regions have been acting as middlemen and selling the products on e-commerce stores such as Taobao, JD.com and Suning at much higher prices.
Chengdu Media Group reported that these private sellers purchased the products from Mao-tai and the Mengniu company and passed on the logistics costs to customers.
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“Every cup of Mao-tai ice cream would cost me at least 30 yuan (US$4.5) on the logistics fee, the profit I got from that was small when I priced it at about US$18,” said one unnamed middleman seller.
A service employee at said the Mao-tai group has acknowledged the issue, but said there was no solution to offer.
News of the price hikes has caused widespread debate, at the time of writing, there were 2,412 comments and 34,000 likes on the Mao-tai Weibo post.
One said: “Apparently the ice cream products were sought after, but I was wondering who would buy such expensive ice cream. ”
Another said: “I wouldn’t buy any of them, as it is too expensive.”
However, many Weibo users defended the Mao-tai brand, claiming the overcharging has nothing to do with the brand and blamed the private sellers market.
One said: “The middlemen are putting the price up, not the Mao-tai brand itself. Why do the public complain about the brand?”
Another added: “When the market was chaotic like that, how would I dare support those domestic brands with the intention to produce good products?”
According to Chinese news outlet Business Review, increasing costs of dairy and sugar products this year have hit ice cream manufacturing in China with more expensive prices as a result.
Data showed that size of the ice cream market in China has risen three years in a row, standing at 138 billion yuan (US$21 billion) in 2019, 147 billion yuan in 2020, and 160 billion yuan in 2021, Tencent News reported.
